Endless Sky Delta v0.10.11.5 parallel release

Welcome to the v0.10.11.5 parallel release!

First off, a note about versioning. In order to have a numeric differentiator, after some discussion I decided to add that additional .5 on the end for Delta's in order to provide a bit more differentiation and to allow it to fall into proper numeric order relative to upstream; given that these parallel releases always happen after upstream's release, and often have a few merges from upstream after their release (not to mention all the additional mechanics and content in Delta already), that it seems reasonable to add that to document that it is a later version.

This release has a few really major mechanics changes to be aware of, in no particular order of importance.

Code to enable permanent changes to the player's flagship.

Yes, you read that right. Missions can now make permanent alterations to the players flagship. These aren't just giving the player an outfit that changes something, this is writing things directly into the ship definition of the player's flagship. It supports both modifying values (things like adding +1 thruster slot or -150 hull), as well as setting attributes to specific numbers (for instance, you could zero-out a ship's fuel capacity, or set their sheilds to a specific amount). These can either go in the root level of an on <offer/accept/etc> or in an action node. See #190 for more details.

This is a huge advancement in the capability for content creators to interact with what is, in effect, the second most important character in the game: The player's ship. It is worth noting that this can only affect things within the attribute tag of the ship definition, so it cannot do things like add hardpoints or change the sprite. These are highly desired capabilities that we really should have, so if anyone can figure out how to do it, it would be much appreciated!

Lateral thrust as a stand-alone attribute

ES Delta has had lateral thrust for a while now; largely set via a formula that used the ship's mass to determine a ratio of how much lateral thrust they had based on their forward thrust. This was interesting, but lacked the customisability people have come to expect from their ships. As such, lateral thrust is now a stand-alone attribute.

Ratio-based lateral thrust is still available, but now it is an attribute that can be specified directly on a ship or outfit instead of being a game-engine level formula. So, for instance, one could create a ship with lateral ducting (or perhaps vectored thrust?) where it automatically has lateral thrust equal to 25% of its forward thrust. There are also optional ratios set up so that content creators can differentiate between setups where that doesn't affect the forward thrust, versus ones where it does affect it (and thus be able to differentiate between situations where the lateral thrust is just drawing off forward thrust without affecting it, versus diverting a bunch of the power and thus reducing it.

At the end of the day, the goal is to provide content creators the ability to make exactly the sorts of things they want to create, and allow the most diversity possible.

Lateral Thrust Components

In order to integrate lateral thrust as a stand-alone capability, and keep the AI reasonably functional, additional engine components have been added to the game. More testing is required, but generally speaking the AI as originally programmed required Drag-In-Space to erase lateral motion as a ship moved forward to allow ships to be functional. This functionality was replaced by lateral thrust back when it was introduced. As such, having lateral thrust on all NPC ships is generally considered a requirement to keep the game functional. The AI can handle not having lateral thrust somewhat, but it becomes much less functional.

In any case, a quick look at the outfitter will note that there have been a whole range of "Lateral Thrusters" or "Lateral Thruster Components (LTCs)" added to the various outfit ecosystems. All the "engines" (aka steering+thrusters combined units) have had lateral thrust equal to about 80-90% of its thrust added to it. For every thruster, there has been an equivalent lateral thruster added, depending on its size ranking. The tiny lateral thruster has lateral thrust equal to 90% of the tiny forward thruster's performance. Smalls are 80%, mediums are 70%, large are 60%, and huge are 50%. These are not hard and fast rules, but generalities. Depending on the faction and the ecosystem, there are variations in these.

These lateral thrusters have been added to all ships and variants in the game, with very few exceptions; generally matching the model of the thruster. Ex. If a ship has Impala thrusters, it has an Impala lateral thruster. This does mean that every ship now has more engine space to accommodate this, so as a side impact, the player now has a bit more flexibility to make managing the restriction of the slots a bit easier.

Unfortunately, Delta lacks artistic talent, so these all currently re-use the graphics from the thruster they are based off of. New artwork for these would be greatly appreciated.

Reaction Thrusters

One thing that has always annoyed me was that the stock ships came too-well built. Sure, there's always optimizations, but the ships are already to the point where there's no easy upgrades. Everything is a trade-off, right from the simplest upgrade. While this definitely makes sense for more impactful upgrades, it does not makes sense for the bottom end. It also adds a layer of difficulty to new players.

To rectify this, the Reaction line of thrusters. These are bare bones basic thruster type for human space whose absolute reason for continued existence is the fact that they are incredibly reliable, easy to make, and dirt cheap. Mechanically speaking, they are the low hanging fruit for a brand new player. Want to test the waters by upgrading something? Replace the reaction thruster with Ions. It will save a little bit of space, a bit of energy, and get a little better performance. Reactions are closely related to Ions, but take up slightly more space, use a bit more energy, provide somewhat less thrust, and produce a bit more heat. Switching to Ions is an upgrade in every single way, and a downgrade in absolutely nothing.

The lore sprinkled throughout the descriptions is that these Reaction engines are the gold-standard for reliability in human space, with the fewest warranty claims of any other propulsion type and the least amount of maintenance required. Granted that reliability and maintenance are not mechanics that we have, but it's still interesting lore. This is reinforced by having the cheapest manufacturing process. Combine best reliability with cheapest manufacturing, and the net result is that these are the types of engines that most shipyards put on their ships as stock, since they do not want warranty claims, and, well, cheaper components means higher profit margins. If the customer wants to tear them out and replace them with atomics before the first test flight, well, that's the customer's business, and any problems is thus the customer's responsibility and not theirs.

Variable Fuel Consumption for intersystem travel

In order to help differentiate different sizes of ships, the mass-based hyperspace fuel cost has been implemented across all methods of HD, SD, and JD travel. These drives still have the same base rate, but is then adjusted at a rate of 4 fuel per 100 mass, with the base mass set to 900. This means that ships that have a lower total mass than 900 will cost less than the normal amount, while ships over 900 will cost more. The fuel capacities for ships have been adjusted so that their effective range remains roughly the same. Details are available here: #123

More Information for the Player!

Given that fuel consumption can now vary, the player needs ways to know about it. Likewise, given the potential importance of solar wind and solar power, they should be able to learn about those too. Personally, I prefer to think of everything in-game being in-game things, so everything on the UI is stuff my pilot is seeing in their cockpit. As such, I don't like having to break immersion to change how my pilot sees things in their cockpit. As such, these new pieces of information can be displayed or hidden by installing or removing outfits that have the appropriate attributes.

Of note, there is the astronomical sensor in #164 that gives system information on the absolute strength of the solar wind and solar power (this does not depend on your ship's ramscoop or solar panels, just informs the player of what the system actually has, and is displayed over by the RADAR.

There are also outfits that change the display of fuel bars to break up the fuel into segments based on the ship's HD, SD, JD, or fixed fuel amounts; as well as outfits that display these amounts (and the ship's current mass) as numbers next to it. All are optional things that the player can choose to install if they want the info, or not if they don't want it.

Summary

There are a lot of changes in here, and these are just some of the highlights. As always, things are moving forward with lots of new ideas. This particular update, though, with the addition of the ability to directly touch the flagship attributes, feels like a major step forward to giving content creators the tools they need to make engaging stories that are so much more impactful than what we have done previously.

Help Wanted

There is a need for artists! All those Lateral engines, across all species, all need unique imagery. New images for any of them would be welcome. There's a few other spots where new imagery would be welcome too.

A bit thing that is really needed are engine mods. Ideas, suggestions, and implementations across all species would be very welcome. These are things that aren't engines, but that either modify how the propulsion systems work or maybe don't modify it, but logically is something that might tie in there anyway. To use cars as an anaology, turbochargers, nitro systems, tune-ups, and replacement of generic parts with quality after-market upgrades, mufflers, amplifiers, and things that make the exhaust belch fire are all good examples of engine modifications. These should all be things that aren't huge impacts, but noticeable.

What's Changed

• fix(typo): Endless Sky -> Endless Sky Delta in the "friendly author" phrase by @TheGiraffe3 in #115
• feat(code): Hardpoint Empty Label clarification by @Zitchas in #117
• feat(content): Scale Sabik by @TheGiraffe3 in #104
• feat(content): Scaling Kornephoros by @TheGiraffe3 in #102
• feat(data); Lampyrid Start by @Zitchas in #116
• Feat(code): Converting pylon to missile pylon for ease of understanding by @Zitchas in #121
• New uninhabited planet: Donya by @TheGiraffe3 in #131
• A few bug fixes in the Thermal Scanner missions by @TheGiraffe3 in #130
• fix(bug): hostilize Korath mission spawns by @TheGiraffe3 in #125
• feat(data): Hyperjump fuel cost varies by mass by @Zitchas in #123
• feat(data): Creating the Random Author Disco Ball Person by @Zitchas in #134
• feat(data): Add a Hai person ship: Sanujab by @TheGiraffe3 in #136
• feat(data): Two more person ships: Intola and Verdorve by @TheGiraffe3 in #144
• Have Korath draw the Archons as scorpions instead of spiders to reduce confusion by @ravenshining in #141
• feat(data): Replacing small killer pirate variants with new variants better suited to looting by @Zitchas in #147
• fix(bug): less than a year -> just over a year by @TheGiraffe3 in #155
• Feat(code): Fixes the ship info and Hardpoint tooltip system to work again. by @Zitchas in #156
• Feat(fix): Donya sprite typo by @MadisonianX in #168
• Remove PRs to Endless Sky Assets and High DPI repos from the PR template by @TheGiraffe3 in #165
• Update credits.txt by @TheGiraffe3 in #174
• Feat(code): Update UI for current system by @MadisonianX in #166
• feat(test): Updating tests with changes in Pylons by @Zitchas in #177
• Feat(test): pylons in tests part 2 by @Zitchas in #178
• feat(test): Pylons in tests (part 3) by @Zitchas in #179
• Feat(test): Updating Bactrian fuel quanitity in test by @Zitchas in #180
• Feat(code): Add Intrasolar ship category & update flight check by @MadisonianX in #167
• feat(update): 2024-12-19 Code & test framework by @Zitchas in #183
• Feat(update): 2024-12-22 update requiring careful handling due to removal of erase breaking the compilation by @Zitchas in #186
• Feat(update): 2025-01-01 update all except to spawn condition by @Zitchas in #188
• Fix the Fleet conflicts by @warp-core in #189
• feat(code): Moving Lateral Thrust to a stand-alone attribute & Adding a new baseline Engine set by @Zitchas in #151
• fix(content): Make Aberrant player rep properly negative, fix Windjam… by @Zitchas in #201
• feat(fix): Spelling by @Zitchas in #202
• feat(update): 2025-01-24 Regular update by @Zitchas in #203
• feat(code): Permanent changes to the player's ship via conversation actions. by @Zitchas in #190
• Remove Particle Cannons from Syndicate, Civillian Fleets by @ravenshining in #194
• Feat(code): Add HUD display for Solar Power and Solar Wind by @MadisonianX in #164
• Ceres, Eris, Ice Asteroids, and the Kuiper Belt by @ravenshining in #193
• feat(update): 2025-02-02 by @Zitchas in #206
• feat(fix): Fixing the Settings panel alignment by @Zitchas in #207
• feat(c): Starry Map cleanup by @Zitchas in #208

New Contributors

• @ravenshining made their first contribution in #141
• @MadisonianX made their first contribution in #168

Full Changelog: v0.10.10-Delta...v0.10.11.5-Delta